Panathinaikos rallies past Zalgiris
PAO won on the road
Panathinaikos Athens picked up a huge 73-78 away win over Zalgiris Kaunas on Thursday night as Roko Ukic scored 11 of his 21 points in the final six minutes and Dimitris Diamantidis set the all-time Euroleague steals record. Panathinaikos, which improved to 5-3 in Group E, now holds a tiebreaker over Zalgiris with two head-to-head victories, while Zalgiris drops to 3-5 and sixth place in the standings. The teams often traded leads, and no team had a lead bigger than 6 points throughout the entire game. The hosts went up 61-56 in the fourth quarter, but Michael Bramos and Diamantidis tied the game before Ukic made his run that secured victory for Panathinaikos. In addition to his 21 points, Ukic also dished out 6 assists. Diamantidis had 13 points plus 10 assists, while James Gist scored 12 and grabbed 9 rebounds. Oliver Lafayette netted 15 for Zalgiris, Ksistof Lavrinovic scored 11, and Marko Popovic 10.